What do you think are the most relevant questions about the problems in the current society around the world that we must ask ourselves?

Perhaps many. But there is one that has come to our consciousness: Why is it that in many countries of the world, despite the economic progress, people are becoming less humane? No doubt, they have more material satisfaction, but less sense of friendship, hospitality, compassion, less “alegría de vivir”. In other words, they have achieved material prosperity but lost human enrichment.

On the contrary, here in the Philippines, most of the people give priority to “concern for others” rather than material things. They have what we call: “Calidad Humana”: Human Compassion, Humanity, Human Tone. Of course there are exceptions; we are not in paradise.

The project has three goals:

To preserve the Calidad Humana among Filipinos. The idea is to create awareness avoiding it´s loss, as it has happened in other countries.

So, in order to continue working in this first goal, (in preserving the Filipino Calidad Humana), we would like to organize seminars, round tables and different kinds of events in universities, schools and other entities of the community.

We are looking forward to publish a “Decalogue” of Calidad Humana, and we would like to invite through a next contest all the teachers of the country to propose the essential principles which would be in this Decalogue.

The second goal intends to explain why Filipinos have this kind of personality. With the support of the five universities committed to this initiative, we will try to research the elements that constitute the Filipino Calidad Humana.

The question is: In what way and by what motives do Filipinos have Calidad Humana, compassion, resiliency, humility, cheerfulness?

An explanation of these elements is fundamental to take the appropriate action in order to cultivate, protect and preserve them.

The project has a third goal. It will try to share the Filipino Calidad Humana with other countries around the world.

How? By showing them one of the major Filipino expressions that depict Calidad Humana: The Smile. With this motivation, we launched a photo contest; “SMILES FOR THE WORLD”, open to all Filipinos in the Philippines and abroad.

The DFA has disseminated the contest through all the Filipino Embassies and Consulates around the world.

The photo shall be accompanied with a message with an explanation addressed to other countries of the world, inviting them to a more friendly, peaceful and compassionated world.

We have the conviction that the Philippines is one of the few countries with this kind of Calidad Humana, in a time of global crisis. This crisis is not only financial or economic, but basically cultural and human.

Just as other countries can export its natural resources or their industrial and technological products, the Philippines is in a unique position to be able to export its human richness to people.

And that is exactly what people of other countries, that have reached an economic wellbeing, need today: human compassion, humanity and Calidad Humana.

We are sure that this Filipino culture and human contribution to the international community will exalt the image of the Philippines.

In this sense, the Calidad Humana Project, while it is a cultural and human initiative, can complement the extraordinary campaign that the Department of Tourism headed by Secretary Ramon Jimenez is doing to promote tourism.

We express our calidad humana chiefly through our smiles. These photos are from Filipinos smiling and inviting you to smile at joys and travails. Smiles for the World is a Filipino invitation towards an even friendlier world. It is a Filipino invitation towards a more human world. It is a Filipino invitation towards a more compassionate world. Share with us calidad humana. Share with us our smiles.